“City Matters” fan committee

Can't believe I missed seeing this - would love to have thrown my hat in the ring. Could have been relevant to about six categories in one hit. Oh well good luck to those who are shortlisted - no doubt a link will be posted to the page in good time
 
Interstate 5 said:
This is a top post.
My issue with the whole "City Matters" initiative - and all the other supposed supporter involvement social media platforms, are that the Club still only do/change those things they were probably going to do anyway. The Cityzens Voice discussion platform is the most obvious case in point. When it started it was all about giving us a voice, tell us what's wrong, tell us how to improve things, and most of the items above were brought up - and swiftly either ignored or we were told they were "taken to the Club", nothing was done and they were swiftly forgotten, until someone brought them up again the following season and received the same response.
I went on there for the first time in ages yesterday to see what's going on, and it's predictably died a death. It's very sad to see something that started off well and with no doubt good intentions so drab and lifeless, like an 80's signing. A few overseas fans asking what people think about "Mahres", where people buy their shirts and for how much, and why the DVD isn't HD.
Of course it's died a death - people will wonder what the point is if nothing changes.
City are very, very good at saying the right thing, putting out the emails, the surveys, the atmosphere texts etc etc, but very, very poor, to the point of frustration, at sorting out the things off the pitch that matter to the regular match-going fan.

I hope this will change things, I really do, but the evidence of the past ten years is against them.
Click to expand...
Good post. The club dropped Points of Blue around 2012 on the grounds that they felt it wasn’t the best way of managing fan relationships. They kept telling us they were working on something else but all we got was surveys, focus groups and Cityzens Voice.

The PL have a rule that clubs must have “structured engagement” with their fans but that’s obviously open to interpretation. The Parliamentary Football Expert Working Group was a little more specific and many clubs introduced some sort of face-to-face mechanism. Some had fan forums, some did it through their Supporters Trust and some had proper representative committees. Liverpool, Chelsea and the rags all have a fan committee and they send heavyweights from the club to these. Richard Arnold & Ed Woodward for the rags, Bruce Buck & Marina Granovskaia at Chelsea and the CEO (used to be Ian Ayre) at Liverpool. The Parliamentary group publish an annual report on progress in the PL and, to be honest, City’s efforts looked pathetic in comparison to most of the other 19 clubs, consisting of Cityzens Voice and sending a few people to Supporters Club Branch meetings. In the meantime, we started meeting as PoB but it was a struggle to get the club to interact in a meaningful way. The fact that City voted against capping away tickets tells you a lot about the hierarchy’s attitude to the match-going fan versus a few extra quid.

So I’m not so näive to think there’s been a fundamental change of heart about fan engagement. More likely than not the club have been leant on by the PL & PFEWG to do this as they’re one of the very few out of line. But at least they’ve done it so that’s a step forward. The test is who turns up from the club. Is there going to be a genuine dialogue between fans and decision makers or will it be a case of Lisa Eaton making notes and then never hearing anything about it again?

I’m happy to give the club the benefit of the doubt and go into this with an open mind, which is why I’ve put myself forward. I hope they’ll realise we aren’t just people who want something for nothing but that there is a sense of frustration among many match-going fans.
 
Last edited:
They could do with sorting out service from 115 to 121 (South Stand Lower.) Bottle bars and mobile beer vendors would make it more attractive pre-match than one of the few pubs walking distance from the ground. It’d be great to get huge numbers in an hour before kick off but it’s just undrinkable piss beer served by someone plucked from the benefits queue. Imagine the atmosphere if it was alright!
 
Don’t know what the selection process will be but hopefully the club will be sensible enough to choose a broad demographic of fans that will represent all different types and cover a wide range of observations. We certainly need the young represented; they are the future of the club and probably main demographic that can help improve the stadium atmosphere.

And before people ask I’m probably classed as being on the fringes of ‘young’.
 
Suppose to go live today but nothing so far. Anyone else taking part heard anything?
 
1. Stop giving so many away tickets to corporates (United finally got their way with this at their club)
2. Less club provided plastic flags/fireworks for club lead displays on CL nights, just let us do our own, it’s less forced, less shit
3. Stop putting seasoncard prices up!

That’s all I want from the club

Oh and 4. Knock down the East Stand and build a giant one tier’d super stand at the side of the pitch for Safe Standing like the old Kippax was (yes, I know, never going to happen!)
 
It's gone very quiet. Even by City's current standards, a level of disconnect on an "initiative" that's supposed to improve connection with supporters is pretty special.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Unread Posts

Don't have an account? Register now and see fewer ads!

SIGN UP
Back
Top
✖
  AdBlock Detected
Bluemoon relies on advertising to pay our hosting fees. Please support the site by disabling your ad blocking software to help keep the forum sustainable. Thanks.